Nominations due for Orchids & Onions awards

Results to be released Nov. 4

Nominations close Aug. 31, on the annual Orchids & Onions contest that celebrates the good and shames the bad in the region's built environment.

Sponsored by the San Diego Architectural Foundation, the program began in the 1970s and takes a light-hearted but pointed view of development. The results are scheduled to be announced Nov. 4.

A seven-member jury will take several hundred suggestions and narrow them down to a dozen or more recipients. Orchid winners will receive bouquets of orchids, Onion winners, a bunch of onions.

"We are looking forward to working with the distinguished members of this year's jury," said Jay Janda, this year's program chairman. "Each has demonstrated considerable commitment to excellence in San Diego's built environment and cultural growth, and will bring that experience and passion to the Orchids & Onions selection process.

The program's website lets visitors see what's been proposed so far, and at the head of the list are first two projects that give a flavor of what the public thinks about the buildings and spaces around them.

(Sometimes owners and their consultants nominate their properties, and at other times disgruntled neighbors nominate each other -- something the jurors have to sort out.)

The Solana Executive Plaza Building is nominated for an Orchid for an "economic facelift" when the owners "didn't have it in their financial plans to do a complete remodel."

A Fresh & Easy market is nominated for an Onion because it is "a carbon copy of any other Fresh & Easy store."